[1] The series centers on Scott in the role of Neil Brock, a New York City social worker who works for the private agency Community Welfare Service, with his secretary, Jane Foster, played by actress Cicely Tyson.

East Side/West Side received eight Emmy nominations and much critical praise, but only mediocre ratings and little support from the CBS brass, who saw it as a show whose perceived prestige didn't translate into commercial success.

The show's executive producer, David Susskind, began a letter-writing campaign to government officials, newspaper editors, and other prominent individuals to gain support for renewal of the series.

East Side/West Side started as a vehicle for George C. Scott, who had recently gained prominence after acclaimed theatrical performances and a series of important films.

The president of CBS, James Aubrey, introduced Scott to an independent producer David Susskind, who turned to his friend Robert Alan Aurthur, a talented television playwright, for a screenplay conception.

With the approval of Aubrey and his newest television star, David Susskind began production on Aurthur’s pilot script, a story about a teen gang killer and his path through the legal system, now called It’s War, Man.

[3] The central location of the series was the Community Welfare Service (CWS), a private agency that served as home base for three social workers dedicated to solving the daily problems, major and minor, of the residents of an impoverished Manhattan neighborhood.

[4] "It's War, Man" resembled an episode of the contemporary courtroom procedural series The Defenders and gave little indication of the shocking, socially conscious show that East Side/West Side would become.

This group, consisting of the sick, disabled, elderly, minorities of color, and members of female-headed families, had not, Harrington argued, benefited from post-World War prosperity.

In January 1963, Dwight Macdonald provided an exhaustive summary of previous studies on poverty in an important article entitled "Our Invisible Poor" in The New Yorker magazine.

Once elected, he established the President's Committee on Juvenile Delinquency and Youth Crime, which sponsored employment programs, manpower training, remedial education, anti-discrimination campaigns, and neighborhood development centers in several cities.

An episode of "East Side/West Side" on an African American couple in Harlem was blacked out by CBS affiliates in Shreveport, Louisiana, and Atlanta, Georgia, primarily for racial reasons.